Ward's Doghouse
by blakiswhite
Summary: Skye has to prove herself to Ward if she wants to stay on the team (following the episode 'girl in the flower dress').
1. Chapter 1

Skye headed back to her room, trying to ignore the weight of the metal bracelet on her right hand. It was more of a walk of shame really. As soon as she stepped into the living room the voices of Ward, May and Fitzsimmons immediately hushed.

 _'Wow, I wonder who they were talking about? '_ She thought sarcastically

Skye looked up to find each of them trying desperately not to make eye contact with her, all with a look of betrayal upon their face. Skye quickly crossed the living room, her eyes on the floor, guilt weighing down on her heavier with each step. Finally she reached her room and slammed the door.

Defeated, she sunk to the floor, her head in her hands.

'you idiot Skye! You've ruined everything.'

She bit back the urge to break something. She wanted to run into a wall, punch something, feel glass cut her skin. Anything to distract her from that voice that kept telling her 'it's all your fault. This is what you do. You get close to people and then you betray them, run away, smash everything that was good up until its irreparable, splintered into a hundred pieces… and now you have nothing." But instead she just sat there, staring into the blackness of her room, feeling the hot tears run down her face.

It seemed like it must have been hours later, but when she was finally finished crying about how pathetic she was, she grabbed her iPod, and blasted some loud music through her headphones. Desperately hoping to evade her frustrated emotions, she drifted off to the sound of Kasabian lulling her into a fitful sleep.

Her alarm went off at 5:00, waking Skye suddenly from a nightmare, she yelled out as she sat up to quickly and banged her head on the roof

'Owwww'. She winced as she rubbed her head, trying to remember what she had dreamed about. All that remained from the dream was her pounding chest, and sweaty palms.

 _Probably just the usual_ she thought; being chased down a corridor by someone she couldn't see, but she could hear his pounding steps, and the sound of him calling her name. She always got the feeling that she was being cornered, that a wall was going to come down in front of her and she would finally be captured. But she never was. She never saw the man's face. He never caught up to her. All she ever got was an increasing feeling of claustrophobia as she felt like she was running around in circles, with dark walls pressing down on her. Eventually, the anxiety would be too much for her and she would wake up suddenly, shaking violently and gasping for breath.

She rolled out of bed, with a groan. As she reached out to turn off her alarm, she saw the metal bracelet dangling from her wrist, and then she slumped back into bed.

 _Ward wouldn't schedule training for this morning right? He hates me. He can't even look at me. I wouldn't be surprise if he asked to stop being my SO._

Battling with herself, Skye decided to succumb to sleep once again. _I doubt he'll even notice_ , consoling herself before burying her face in her pillow once again.

About twenty minutes later, Skye was just beginning to drift off again when someone banged open her door, and yanked her headphones from her head.

"Get. Up"

Skye sat up too quickly, and banged her head again. Hard.

"What?" she asked, confused as she clutched her throbbing head.

Ward stared down at his rookie, his arms crossed. "I don't know if you noticed Skye but I don't like having my time wasted. Now get up, get dressed, and get your ass down to the gym now".

"I didn't know -"

Ward cut her off with a glare, and a dangerously low voice, "this is your last chance. You can either commit yourself to becoming a shield agent or you're not going to be on the team much longer. Either way, make a decision because I don't have much patience left".

Skye's cheeks tinged red, as she failed to shake the feeling that she was a five year being scolded by a teacher.

"I'm sorry Ward. I-"

He cut her off.

"I don't want your apologies Skye. Until you can prove yourself to me, your apologies mean nothing."

Skye disentangled herself from her sheets and got out of her bed, mostly because she couldn't stand Ward speaking down to her as if she was a disobedient child.

Trying to ignore the fact that her pyjamas only consisted of an oversized Captain America sweatshirt, she faced him.

He still stood a whole head taller than her, so she took advantage of this. She stared determinedly at his chest so she didn't have to look into his eyes and see the anger she knew was there.

"Okay?" she said uncertainty. "so how can I prove myself?"

"By not stabbing us in the back again". There were the bitter words she had been waiting for. His voice cut like knives, and she was waiting for the full on rant now. She knew it had to be coming, but then he sighed.

"Just meet me downstairs in ten minutes" he started to move towards the door.

"don't be late" he said right before slamming the door again.


	2. training with an angry ward

Skye arrived at the gym seven minutes later, eager to not give Ward anymore reason to make her do extra push ups than she already had coming. She was already thinking up all the torturous drills he was going to make her do, and was fighting the urge to not groan when he came down the stairs.

"treadmill. fifteen minutes"

Skye sighed, and said quietly under her breath "and the torture begins"

"What was that?" came Ward's voice from over her shoulder.

Shit.

"uhhh… I said 'on it Robot!'"

Before Skye could bite her lip in trepidation, Ward had grabbed her arm and spun her around, pushing her back up against the wall.

"Do I need to remind you that you're hanging by a thread at the moment" he growled. "You let the entire team down and you broke protocol, all for what? So you could see your rising tide boyfriend?"

His strong hands circled around her fragile arms, pressing her firmly up against the rough wall.

"Well now you're going to have to earn back our trust, and you're not getting off to a very good start." His face was inches from hers as he glared down at the small hacker who was purposely trying to look anywhere but at his face.

Ward released her arms, but Skye could still feel the imprint of his hands.

"If you want to earn my trust back" Ward said in a dangerously low voice. "Quit. Making. Jokes. And get going"

Sky didn't need telling twice. Silently cursing herself for being a smartass, she headed over to the treadmill.

After only ten minutes of fast jogging, Skye's muscles were already protesting at her. Skye's recent mission had gotten her slammed up against more walls than she was prepared for, before Ward saved her sorry ass. Again. Once her fifteen minutes were up she tenderly jumped off the treadmill, trying not to aggravate her burning thighs and the stitch that was forming in her shoulder. She walked over to grab a water, but Ward stood in her way, with his arms crossed.

"You can have a drink after you do twenty pull ups."

Her face clearly showed that she was struggling to not retaliate with another comment that might get her anymore admonishments. Ward raised his eyebrows at her, daring her to complain.

Skye grimaced as she took another laborious breath, and wiped the sweat off of her forehead with her arm. Without comment, she stormed over to the bar.

Ward followed her, explaining, "if you're going to become a shield agent, you need to learn discipline, resilience. You have to build up endurance so that you aren't defeated after one fight with the enemy. Because there might just be another ten people waiting around the corner to take you down."

Skye stood under the bar, trying to remind herself that retaliating would only make it worse. She attempted to jump and grab the bar above her, but it was a good two meters above head. She fell back to the ground, landing unsteadily on her already weak legs.

Ward walked behind her and grabbed her waist. Skye desperately wanted to run away, to not feel so powerless next to Ward. He hoisted her up and she grabbed the cold metal bar, trying to ignore her protesting shoulder. With one more deep breath in, she heaved herself up till her chin met level with the bar.

"One" Ward counted.

And so training continued… for the next THREE HOURS

At 8:30 Skye was once again knocked out of breath, as Ward demonstrated, once again, the over shoulder throw. She landed with a loud and sickening thud.

"What did I tell you about rolling out of a landing?" he said exasperatedly. "you're going to injure yourself if you don't have any form. Again." Ward offered his hand to lift her up. She ignored it, and tried to glare at him, but then she put support on her right shoulder and instead she ended up crying out as a stabbing pain went through her arm.

She collapsed back onto the ground, holding her shoulder.

"Okay, okay! Where does it hurt?" Ward demanded as he crouched next to her, placing his hand on the back of her shoulder and with a look of concern on his face that seriously pissed Skye off.

Skye quickly rearranged her face. She was not in the mood for Ward to be feeling sympathetic towards her. His ruthless training drills made her want to scream at him. _Probably exactly what he wanted_ Skye thought bitterly. _That way he has another excuse to punish me. He's a freaking sadist for god's sake!_

"I'm fine" she said stiffly. "it's just a cramp"

"Hang on. I'll get you an icepack. Training's done for today"

 _About time._

"I said it's fine!" She got up off the mat, making sure to not putting any weight on her right arm, and stormed off in the direction of the stairs.


	3. It's complicated

Skye had a hot shower, hoping the heat would relieve the throbbing pain in her arm, and in every other part of her body for that matter. And it did. A little. When she got dressed again she headed back to her room, thankful that she didn't bang into anyone on the way there. She was basically limping. _Damn you Ward_.

When she reached her room, she collapsed on her bed and was asleep within minutes.

Skye woke up with a shiver, as she felt something cold on her shoulder. Ward was sitting on her bed, trying to lift up her shoulder so he could put apply an ice pack.

Skye winced as she tried to shift herself away from him.

"what are you doing?" she asked through gritted teeth, as the pain in her shoulder began to flare up again.

"sorry, I didn't mean to wake you", he said quietly, as he continued to try to shove the ice pack down the back of her jumper.

"Ahhhh.. It's cold" she protested. "and what did you think would happen? That thing is freezing!"

"It'll help numb it, ok? Just stop resisting! I'm trying to help". It was obvious he was trying not to snap at her again.

"Help!? Are you serious? You're ruthless training is why I can barely move it. What the hell Ward?"

"Well if you had listened to what I was saying about keeping a good form, instead of trying to wage your own silent rebellion by not listening to a word I was saying then you wouldn't be in this position. Would you?"

"Jesus Christ! Just leave me alone", Skye said angrily trying to push herself up off the bed. She was forced to lie back down again though when a sharp pain, caused her to inhale sharply, and give in to Ward gently pushing her back down onto the mattress.

Grant sighed, defeated. "look, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have pushed you so hard but if I'm going to be your SO we need to communicate. You have to tell me if you're injured, Skye. It's not going to work if you end up spraining something or with a stress fracture at the end of every training."

She glared at the wall in silence for a few more moments, and then asked "is that what I have? A stress fracture?"

"No. But you do have a strained rotator cuff. And it's not going to get better, unless you stop trying to aggravate it. So just lay still ok. The ice will help."

Grudgingly, she did as he said, and let him take care of her. Gently, he pulled her jumper partly off her shoulder so he could slip the icepack around it.

"I'll be back. I'm just going to get Simmons. She said she would have a look at it when you were awake again." He walked out the door, and returned with Simmons a few moments later. She attended to Skye in a very professional manner, clearly still hurt over the Miles incident. Skye tried to ignore it, but to be honest she was exhausted, both physically and emotionally, so when Simmons asked her to take off her top so she could tape her shoulder, Skye responded with a flat out 'No'.

"Skye, it needs to be taped, otherwise you're going to jar it even more."

Skye didn't really care. She knows it was unfair to act the way she was acting. She did betray them after all, but she refused to play the vulnerable, hurt victim whilst everyone was still staring daggers at her most of the time. Plus, taking her shirt off in front of Ward? Uh uh, no way!

"It's fine. It doesn't even hurt anymore. That ice trick really works I guess." she said dismissively. As if to prove her point, she started to get up out of bed, trying her best to look unfazed when pain shot up her arm.

But before she could make it one step Ward stood in front of her, blocking her way.

"Skye, stop being difficult" he said, exasperated.

Jemma interjected then, "look Skye if you don't want my help fine! But don't come running to me when you make it worse. Anyway, Fitz is paging me. I got to go. Ward make sure you get that arm taped. It's not going to heal otherwise" Jemma didn't even look at Skye before storming out.

"Ward, it's fine! I promise" she pleaded. "I'm sure if I just sleep it off it'll go away by itself".

"No, how about we try something new. How about this time we listen to Ward for once instead of Skye getting her way all the time?" Ward crossed his arms over his chest, making it clear that this wasn't up for discussion.

"But I don't -" Skye protested

" - I don't want to hear it Skye. I'm your SO and you're going to listen to me because for someone as analytically minded as yourself, you have surprisingly bad judgment when it comes to your own health. I'm not going to ask again. Sit. Down!"

Grudgingly, Skye sat on the edge of her bed

 _Great! Well this is going to be embarrassing. Not exactly the way I had pictured taking off my shirt in front of Ward for the first time would be like - not that I had thought about it! Urghh shut up Skye!_ Skye could never seem to shut off her thoughts. Ever! Whether they were in her head or they came out of her mouth (and it was usually the latter), she always had a sarcastic comment or something inappropriate to say for just about every situation.

Skye was trying not to feel humiliated as Ward's hands started tugging at the bottom of her jumper.

"Woah, stop! I'll do it okay?" Skye said hurriedly, moving his hands away.

Skye gasped in pain as she tried to slip her arm out

"easy" Ward warned, helping her to slip the jumper over her head.

Skye sat tensely on the bed, wearing only her jeans and a bra. She did her best to just glare down at the floor, trying really hard not to look at Ward.

 _God this was embarrassing._

When she felt Ward place one hand on her shoulder, trying to place the tape, she immediately felt goose bumps erupt on the back of her neck. _Oh no._

"Skye" Ward sighed. "You have to relax"

Skye glared at the floor.

"I am relaxing" she said through gritted teeth, trying to fend off the shiver that ran down her back at his touch.

"No" he said, and began to massage her shoulder. "you're not"

"Owwww - ahaaaaa" Ward's hands dug into the tender muscle on her shoulder causing Skye to try to wriggle out of his grip, but he wouldn't budge. The tight sore ache in her muscles, coupled with Skye's damned weakness of being ticklish was an unpleasant feeling to say the least. Ward's vexation at her uncooperativeness did not go unnoticed.

"Sit still" he hissed as he tightened his grip on her. "Please tell me that after all of my time training you, you are not going to be defeated by something so pathetic as being ticklish?"

Skye shot a withering look over her shoulder, but the pain that followed from this sudden movement wasn't quite worth it.

Despite this, she had to admit, her shoulder was starting to feel a bit better. At least she didn't feel like it was frozen in a hunched position anymore.

Ward finished taping her arm and then handed her jumper back.

"Rest" he said, standing over her with a knowing look

Skye rolled her eyes, but did what he said and lay back on the bed.

"Sooo, just double checking. I don't have to get up at some ungodly hour tomorrow right? I don't want to be woken up with you standing over me again. It's kinda creepy"

Ward just shook his head, and sighed heavily. ' _Does she ever stop making jokes?'_ Ward thought. Knowing that carrying on this conversation would go nowhere, Ward headed for the door.

"Wait" Skye said quietly as Ward reached the door. He turned around to find Skye staring hesitantly back at him, all joking gone. Skye's hard exterior which was always represented by a coy smile and a sarcastic comment had disappeared. In its place was a sadness in those big brown eyes that shone back at Ward.

"I'm really sorry Ward. I didn't mean to betray you guys. I just…" Skye sighed, defeated. "I just didn't feel like I could tell you guys. Me and Miles - It was either betray you guys or betray him, and we had been through a lot together. I couldn't just…" Skye trailed off, looking at Ward in a way that suggested she was desperate for him to tell her that it was ok. That she hadn't ruined everything.

Ward stood at the door for a few more moments, paralysed. He could walk over to her and tell her that it was all going to be ok. That he understands why she did it. Because he did. Grant understood exactly how she was feeling. It was the way he felt every time he remembered why he was on the plane. Every time he admonished himself for worrying about Skye. For caring about her. Because every time he did Garrett's words echoed in the back of his head.

 _If you're going to work within S.H.I.E.L.D for Hydra you can't ever get attached to anything or anyone…_

So instead, Ward turned his back to her again, and opened the door.

"I know, Skye" he said quietly. "But it doesn't change what you did"…


End file.
